Earl Scruggs, 1924–2012
The virtuoso who popularized the banjo
Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass music, was hunting for a new banjo player when a young musician appeared backstage at a Nashville concert hall, asking to audition. Monroe and his guitarist, Lester Flatt, listened with amazement as the 21-year-old Earl Scruggs picked out lightning-fast runs on his instrument. “If you can, hire him,” Flatt told Monroe, “whatever the cost.” He agreed to pay Scruggs $50 a week, and the young virtuoso soon became the band’s star attraction. When Scruggs stepped up to play a solo, said Monroe biographer Richard D. Smith, audiences “would physically come out of their seats in excitement.”
Born to a musical family in rural Cleveland County, N.C., Scruggs and his two banjo-playing brothers taught one another musical timing “by starting a song and then walking in opposite directions as they played,” said The Washington Post. “They would do this until they played in time with one another when they regrouped.” At age 10, Scruggs began developing a three-finger picking style (most players then used two fingers) that “elevated the five-string banjo from a part of the rhythm section—or a comedian’s prop—to a lead or solo instrument,” said The New York Times.
Scruggs joined Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys in 1945 and played on classic recordings including “Blue Moon of Kentucky” and “Blue Grass Breakdown.” But in 1948 he and Flatt, tired of low pay and exhausting travel, set out on their own as the Foggy Mountain Boys. The group made sparkling recordings, such as the Grammy winning “Foggy Mountain Breakdown,” used in the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde, and “The Ballad of Jed Clampett,” the theme tune of TV show The Beverly Hillbillies.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
But Scruggs became, as he said later, “bored and unhappy doing the same things for over 20 years,” said The Guardian (U.K.), and in 1969 split with Flatt to form the Earl Scruggs Revue with his three sons. The group used amplified instruments, and collaborated with artists as diverse as Bob Dylan, Elton John, and Ravi Shankar. This experimentation cost Scruggs some of his original audience, but it “opened the ears of many rock fans to connections with earlier forms.”
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
-
Today's political cartoons - April 14, 2024
Cartoons Sunday's cartoons - Trump Derangement Syndrome, social media dangers, and more
By The Week US Published
-
5 rambunctious cartoons about the House speakership standoff
Cartoons Artists take on Mike Johnson's night terrors, the Speaker's chair, and more
By The Week US Published
-
The Week Unwrapped: Ultrarunning, menswear and a meaty row
Podcast Is the "Hardest Geezer" a high-endurance trendsetter? Will Ted Baker survive? And what's the beef with lab-grown meat?
By The Week Staff Published
-
Benjamin Zephaniah: trailblazing writer who 'took poetry everywhere'
Why Everyone's Talking About Remembering the 'radical' wordsmith's 'wit and sense of mischief'
By The Week UK Published
-
Shane MacGowan: the unruly former punk with a literary soul
Why Everyone's Talking About The Pogues frontman died aged 65
By The Week UK Published
-
'Euphoria' star Angus Cloud dies at 25
Speed Read
By Catherine Garcia Published
-
Legendary jazz and pop singer Tony Bennett dies at 96
Speed Read
By Devika Rao Published
-
Martin Amis: literary wunderkind who ‘blazed like a rocket’
feature Famed author, essayist and screenwriter died this week aged 73
By The Week Staff Published
-
Gordon Lightfoot, Canadian folk legend, is dead at 84
Speed Read
By Peter Weber Published
-
Barry Humphries obituary: cerebral satirist who created Dame Edna Everage
feature Actor and comedian was best known as the monstrous Melbourne housewife and Sir Les Patterson
By The Week Staff Published
-
Mary Quant obituary: pioneering designer who created the 1960s look
feature One of the most influential fashion designers of the 20th century remembered as the mother of the miniskirt
By The Week Staff Published